Manufacture of shoe heels



Jan. 23, 1940.

'r. B. CLARKE 2,187,825

MANUFACTURE OF SHOE HEELS Filed oct. 12, 1938 til Patented Jan. 23, 1940 UNITED; STATES MANUFACTURE OF sH'oE nEEts Thomas Baggott Clarke, Leicester, England,- assignor to United Shoe Machinery Corporation, Borough or Flemington, N. J., a corporation of New Jersey Application October 12, 1938; Serial" No. 234,662

In -Great Britain November 2, 1937 6 Claims.

This invention relates to the manufacture of shoe heels, parti'cularly heelsof the kind which andconsiderable clifi'lculty occurs when driving ordinary, headed, heel building nails of such lengths in a heel building machine by 'reason of the erratic running of the nails in the pile of lifts while they are being driven. The greater the height 0f the heel, the longer the nailsthat must be used,- and the'longer the nails, the more probable it is that such trouble will'occur. If the nails run in an unduly erratic manner while being driven, their pathsbeingto some extent randoinand notunder control, varioustroubles may occur,'including insecure holding together of the lifts at parts of the heel, danger that nails later driven to attach the heel to a shoe may foul with improperly placed'heel building nails, and danger that in extreme cases a heel buildingnail may run so far astray as to emerge from thesideface of the heel or come sufficiently close to the side face to interfere with the subsequent trimming of the heel.

A large part of the reason for the above-men tioned difiiculties is that, when usingheaded nails, the passages in the nail block'of the heel building machine must be large enough to accommodate the nail heads and, therefore, considerably larger than the shank portions of the nails. play is permitted between each'nail passage and the 'shankof the nail insaid' passage, with the result that there is no accurate control over the direction in which the nail is started into the heel and it is this lack of precise control by the nail guiding passages on the nails that appears responsible, as least in considerable measure, for

the nails runningin an erratic manner ina pile ofv lifts into which they aredriven.

It is the object ofthe present invention to provide a method of making heels whereinthe troubles referred to may be eliminated or greatly reduced. In the accomplishment of thisobject, I have provided a novel method of making a heel which. includes driving a headless nail into a pile of lifts, the nail beingdriven from a drive passage which closely embraces itso that the direction of driving 1 is accurately controlled. and erratic running prevented or minimized, and: then, for

Consequently, a considerable amount of example, compressing the heel between dies, the nail being-such and beingso driven that when the heel is compressed both ends" of the nail are upset by being clinched or spread against the compressing die surfaces, to hold the lifts firmly together.

The above and other objects and features of the invention will be clear" from the following description, read with reference to the'ac'companying drawing, of an'illustr'ative' procedure in" accordance with the invention and oftwo forms of nailswhic'h may be employedihprac'ti'cing the said procedure.

In the drawing,

Fig. 1 shows, prior to" compression, a heel built up from superposed-lifts held in assembled relation by three nails driven therein from the tread end of the heel and by one short nail driven therein froin the attaching-"face end;

Fig. 2 shows more clearly the forinofone er the nails seen'in' Fig. 1'; I

Fig. 3 shows the heelof Fi'g'. inter compression;

Fig.4 shows on" marge-meme than Fig. 1 part of the heel shown in Fig. 1;

Fig. 5" shows on a'larg'er scale than Fig. 3'part of theheel shown in Fig. 3

Fig. 6 shows the manner in which the three nails are driven in building the heel shown in Fig. l;

Fig. '7 shows on a larger scale than Fig. 6' certain parts shown in Fig. 6';

Fig. 8 shows the form of another na'il"\vhicl1 may be used in practicing the invention;

Fig. 9' shows a plate which itm'ay be'found advantageous to use in compressing the heel shown in Fig". 1;-and- Figvlll shows the heel of Fig. 1 beingcompressed. I

The'invention will be described in connection with the manufacture of a cornpa'ratively high heel for a womans shoe, namely a heel built'up from fifteen lifts L, of which themajority are leatherboard, the lower two or three lifts being of leather; This heel when attached to a; shoe will be about two inches high atits breast. In carrying out the illustrative procedure use is made of a heel building machine; parts of which are shown in Figs. 6 and? and which isconstructed and arranged in much the same manner as the machinedescribed in United States Letters Patent No. 2,046,443, granted July '7, 1936 upon an application filed inthe nam'esof W. R. Barclay et al. This heel building machine 'hasxa mold l l corresponding-to the" mold designated by the reference character in the said patent and a nail block I 5 corresponding to that shown at ID in the patent, from any or all of three passages IS in which one or more nails may be driven upward by drivers l1 corresponding to the drivers shown at [8 in the said patent.

The fifteen lifts L are first assembled in a pile in the mold H and then the machine is set in operation, whereupon the nails 53 are driven into the pile of lifts from the tread end thereof and a short nail I9 is driven into the pile at the attaching face end by means corresponding to that of the machine described in the Barclay et al. patent.

The three nails [3 (of which but two are shown in Fig. 1) are of appropriate length and thickness for the heel being built, each nail being cylindrical for the most part and having a smooth shank 2|. Each nail l3 has a pointed end terminating a tapering portion 23 about oneeighth inch in length and at its head end, instead of a head, each nail has a recess 25. The recess 25 is conical in shape, as shown in Figs. 2, 4 and 7, and constitutes the whole end surface of the nail. Since the nails is have no heads they can readily be driven through passages only slightly larger in diameter than the shanks 2|. For example, the passages H5 in the nail block l5 may be about .116 inch in di ameter when nails having a diameter of .104 inch are to be driven. I have found that passages of this size serve to embrace the nails sufficiently closely during driving to insure that the paths of the nails will be controlled within much closer limits than has hitherto been the case when headed nails have been driven in similar fashion. The amount of clearance, .006 inch, between the nails [3 and the passages I6 is not enough to allow any substantial degree of erratic running but is enough to allow the nails readily to be inserted in the passages it even though, as sometimes happens, the nails may have very small projecting fins around the recesses 25 resulting from the manner in which the nails have been manufactured.

The nail drivers I! have conical tips, as shown at 21, which cooperate with the recesses 25 in the nails during the driving operation in the manner illustrated in Fig. 7 and the extent of movement of the drivers is such that the nails are not driven flush with the surface of the tread end of the heel but are left projecting a short distance therefrom, as shown in Figs. 1 and 4.

After the nails l3 have been so driven by the heel building machine, the heel is transferred to a compressing machine, parts of which are shown in Fig. 10. This machine is constructed and arranged in much the same manner as the machine described in United States Letters Patent No. 776,875, granted December 6, 1904, upon an application filed in the name of Eliphalet A. Tripp, and the heel is subjected therein to a compressing operation. As compressing pressure is applied, the nails 13 are clinched over at their pointed ends upon the attaching face and of the heel by the heel seat die 3! of the'compressin-g machine. At the same time, however, the other ends of the nails l 3 are forced against a flat toplift plate 33 of the compressing machine and the effect of the pressure is such as to cause these ends of the nails to spread out laterally so that the recesses 25 disappear and heads 29 are formed (see Fig. 5), which heads may be about .128 inch or more in diameter. Should the heel tend to expand heightwise when the compressing pressure is released, it is found that the heads 29 thus formed upon the nails in most instances satisfactorily prevent the lower lift M adjacent to the heads 29 from forcing itself off the nails, the nails securely holding the pile of lifts together.

Fig. 8 shows another form of nail 35 which may be used and which resembles the nail l3 in all respects except that it has a shank 3'! which, instead of being smooth, has for the most part a screw threaded exterior, as shown in Fig. 8. At one end the nail 35 has a recess 39 like the recess 25 and adjacent to this end the shank 31 has a short length of its exterior, as shown at 4|, which is smooth and is not screw threaded, the periphery of the recess 39 being thus smooth and continuous. Three nails 35 may in certain circumstances be advantageously employed alternatively to the three nails IS in carrying out the procedure just described. When nails 35 are so used the screw threaded exteriors of their shanks assist in holding the lifts L together against expansion after compression and thereby further reduce the danger of the lift M becoming loose. It is believed also that when nails 35 are so used, a greater force being necessary to drive the nails through the lifts L, the compression is more effective to cause the formation of heads on the nails and less likely to cause the nails to pass through the lifts L without satisfactory formation of the heads but with a greater degree of clinching at the attaching face end of the heel.

Fig. 9 shows a top-lift plate 43 which may be used alternatively to the plate 33 and which has three suitably spaced shallow circular recesses in which the recessed ends of the nails [3 or 35 are accommodated at the beginning of the compression of the heel. As a result, at the finish of the compression, there is a short space between the heads formed on the nails and the lift M, which allows the heel to expand slightly after compression without the lift M becoming loose.

While, for purposes of illustration, two specific forms of headless nails suitable for use in practicing the method of the present invention have been illustrated and described, it is apparent that headless nails of many other forms could be used as long as both ends of the nails are capable of being sufficiently clinched, spread or otherwise upset by the pressure exerted upon them by the top-lift and heel seat dies of the heel compressing machine to insure that they will hold the heel lifts securely together under compression and not permit the endmost lifts of the heel to become detached.

Having described the invention, what is claimed as new and desired to be secured by Letters Patent is:

1. The method of making a heel which comprises assembling a plurality of heel lifts into a pile, driving a headless nail into said pile, and then upsetting both ends of the nail, one upon the tread face end and the other upon the attaching face end of the heel.

2. The method of making a heel which comprises assembling a plurality of heel lifts into a pile, driving a headless nail into said pile, compressing the pile and, in the compressing oper ation, upsetting both ends of the nail, one upon the tread face end and the other upon the attaching face end of the heel.

3. The method of making a heel which comprises assembling a plurality of heel lifts into a pile, driving a headless nail into said pile, com- 10 by form a head upon the nail.

5. The method of making a heel which comprises assembling a, plurality of heel lifts into a pile, driving a headless, pointed nail into the tread end of the pile, compressing the pile and,

in the compressing operation, clinching the point end of the nail upon the attaching face end of the heel and spreading the other end of the nail to form a head upon the tread face end of the heel.

6. The method of making a heel which comprises assembling a plurality of heel lifts into a pile, driving a headless nail for such a distance into the pile as to leave its head end projecting a short distance therefrom, compressing the pile 10 and, in the compressing operation, upsetting and I forming a head upon the projecting head end of the nail.

THOMAS BAGGOTT CLARKE. 

